The company that manages the Romanian state’s participation in energy companies, SAPE, is carrying out consultations until August 8 in order to eventually contract a feasibility study on the Tarnita-Lapustesti reversible, pumped hydropower plant, the Ministry of Energy announced.

The feasibility study will be contracted to establish solutions for the construction of a pumped storage hydroelectric power plant with a capacity between 500 and 1,000 MW. The project is particularly important for accommodating intermittent energy production capacities such as wind and solar.

The feasibility study will contain the feasible solutions for the construction of the plant, and the cost-benefit analyses carried out for the solutions proposed, elaborated in the existing legislative and technical-economic conditions.

The study will also include the urbanism certificate, the conforming approvals for ensuring utilities, as well as specific opinions, agreements and studies, as appropriate, depending on the specifics of the investment objective, including the one for connection to the electricity transmission network and the environmental approval.

In 2019, the government approved one of the oldest energy projects initiated by Nicolae Ceausescu since the 1970s, a project relaunched, but not implemented by all governments after the fall of communism.

Hidro Tarniţa SA company was set up in 2013 to implement the project, initially intended with the participation of companies from China.

A feasibility study carried out in 2019 estimated the needed investments at €1.15bn, the execution of the works being foreseen to take place over seven years with commissioning in two stages.

In the summer of 2021, four South Korean companies showed interest in getting involved in the resuscitation of the energy project to build and operate the 1,000 MW pumped storage hydropower plant.